Africa-Press – Tanzania. THE main opposition party CHADEMA is scheduled to hold peaceful demonstrations to demand removal of elections and political parties bills from Parliament and instead the government focus on emergency plans to address inflation and high cost of living.
This was stated yesterday in Dar es Salaam by the party’s Permanent Secretary John Mnyika during a press conference where he said that the party has already notified police of the planned demos.
Mnyika said that on January 24th, 2024 demonstrators are scheduled to move from Mbezi Mwisho and Buguruni and finally meet at the United Nations offices in Dar es Salaam where they expect to be received by international organizations.
He explained that the notice has been delivered to commanders of the following police districts: Gogoni, Buguruni, Oysterbay, Mburahati and Msimbazi where the protests are scheduled to pass through.
“The main agenda of the demonstration is to push the government to listen to the voices of the people who demand removal of elections and political parties bills so that a new process commences after the amendment of the Constitution of 1977. We also want the government to create an emergency plan to address the rise in cost of living and inflation,” he said.
“The notice letter has been written today January 17th, 2024 and submitted to commanders of the police districts where the protests will pass through. The protests will commence at 09am from Buguruni and Mbezi Mwisho routes and stop at the UN offices along Sam Nujoma Road at 14pm on Wednesday, January 24th.
The police commanders have not responded to the notice. However, in my position as chief executive of this party, the protests were planned by the party’s central committee and were declared by the party’s national chairman. Therefore, the demonstration will go on as planned.”
Mnyika called upon members of the public to show up in large numbers and participate in the peaceful demonstrations.
He said that the reason for converging at the United Nations head office in the city is due to the fact that Tanzania has signed and agreed to execute various conventions that provide that the government should listen to the people and respect their opinions as well as commitment to ensure free and fair elections.
“The United Nations being an international family is a place of refuge. Tanzania consented to various agreements which required citizens to have a good life, to be listened to, for the government to respect public authority and the presence of free and fair elections. Therefore, the UN is a safe haven to go to following the inaction of the leaders on issues that need to be heard,” said Mnyika.
“In 2022, the UN dispatched a United Nations Needs Assessment Mission to come and assess the elections in collaboration with Tanzania to enable the nation to practice free, fair and lawful elections. We acknowledge the UN delivered a report to the government and made several recommendations. However, by looking at the existing bills in the parliament, our national chairman explained on 13th January that the current bills have not addressed fundamental problems that were highlighted by the public, CHADEMA, the taskforce, international election observers or any other commission, including the Warioba Commission.”
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